Wednesday Motu

Today was another beautiful day on the Motu. We headed out to a different section than where we fished on Tuesday in search of some big brownies. Well, we found them allright. I had a cast at a nice fish sitting in a rather precarious spot with a stump just to the right and in front of him and a willow tree to the left and another big snag in the middle. The chances of landing this trout were not good to say the least. Well, I had to have a try, so with just one perfect cast, I hooked the trout which exploded into action and I had a good tug of war to keep him out of all the snags which seemed to be everywhere. I percervered and managed to land a beautiful 8-9 pound brown trout. What a beauty!

The day went on with much the same, casting to large trout. Sometimes I was fortunate enough to land them and sometimes not. I did catch some beauties though and here are a few pics of them.


Tomorrow we are off to the Ruakituri River for the largest rainbows to be had in all of New Zealand. It’s also the eastern most rainbow trout fishery in the country. Frank owns a cabin on the Ruakituri, knicknamed the Ruakituri Hilton. I have high hopes for a big rainbow tomorrow. We’ll spend the night in Gisborne tomorrow night and then I’ll have a town day on Friday while I’m waiting to fly down to Christchurch on the South Island Friday afternoon. It will be Thanksgiving Day in the US. If I don’t get my next blog written in time, Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

Ciao for now.....

Te Kaha to Motu

On Monday morning, my friend Frank, a lodge owner, met me in Te Kaha and we drove back to Motu by way of the Waioeka River so we could have a flick of the old fly rod enroute. The rivers are somewhat low but clear as a bell so we saw lots of trout and I managed to hook 4 nice trout and land NONE! Oh well, we will be fishing the evening rise tonight on the Motu so I guess I can wait! After a nice dinner with some of New Zealand's premier Sauvignon Blancs and Pinot Noir, we headed out around 8:00 pm for the evening rise. There is a good caddis hatch here on the Motu as well as various and assorted mayflies. This is a clay bedded stream so no stone flies found here.

The evening rise got off to a slowish start but as it grew darker and darker, the fish were really starting to feed and I finally redeemed myself and caught a nice brown trout before it got too dark to recognize what it was.

Today, Tuesday, we spent the day on the Motu. This is a heavily regulated river on the north island between Gisborne and Opotiki and is all, for the most part, on private land which Frank has exclusive rights to fish. This is all farm land with beautiful green pastures full of sheep, cows, BULLS!!! and the most beautiful slow meandering stream running through it all. It's easy walking, wading and spotting since there are high banks on one side and gravel bars on the other. The easy way to do this with a guide is for the guide to be on the high bank spotting the fish and you are on the opposite side of the river casting to the fish as he tells you where it is and you are best to spot the fish first before casting.

This river is insanely full of trout. Today alone just in one beat, we counted easily over 100 fish and all brownies. Mostly in the 4-7 pound range. I managed to hook about 10 fish or so and landed about 6. I'm not going to say how many I totally missed because they got spooked. Then there are the three or so that were nice big fish and wrapped the leader around a log and got off. Geez these are smart fish!



Tonight we'll go out for the evening rise again and then tomorrow we have new water to fish and will go play with the rainbows.

Paua recipe from Te Kaha

I'm off to Motu today and we're going to fish our way from Te Kaha to Motu so will report back later with the full story.

Perfect Te Kaha Day Video Clip

The Perfect Te Kaha Day

Ah, the weather couldn't have been nicer today. We headed out to the kingfish hot spot to jig for big kingies. After losing four rather expensive lures to barracuda, we finally landed some lnice kingfish. The fish they refer to as kingfish here are what we refer to as California yellowtail which we fish for on the Sea of Cortez in Baja. Our fish don't get nearly as big as the kingfish get here. We landed two, the first being around 20 pounds and the big one weighing in around 42 or so pounds. A respectble fish for sure and excellent eating. Paul was the hero of the day landing the big one.

Now that we'd lost our big jigs and growing weary of the barracuda that were plaguing us, we decided to head to a new spot for Terakihi for dinner. Now it was Lee who was the hero of the day. All in all, we landed about 11 Terakihi for our fish and chips meal tonight. Terakihi is my favorite food fish of New Zealand with a delicate but sweet flavor.

OK, now we know we have enough food for a respectable feed but we're not finished yet! Next we headed off to the rocks that were visible at low tide to dive for green lip mussels and paua (abalone). Oh and lets not forget the crayfish! Lee was our diver of the day and came back with his bag full of mussels, paua and crays. Wow, this is going to be some feast tonight!

Auckland to Te Kaha

Well, finally, Auckland, New Zealand. After an extremely full, packed to the gills flight from LA with not a seat to spare on the plane, we touched down in Auckland, City of Sails, New Zealand. After a hot shower and activating my cell phone, I was feeling pretty human for a change. The weather was not what I was hoping for...overcast and light rain socked in. After a long layover in Auckland and a ride around to the domestic terminal, I was finally on my last flight of 4. I arrived in Taraunga on the Bay of Plenty. My friend Paul O'Brien met me at the airport and we were off and running to Te Kaha. Now, let me explain the dilemma of having the most popular guy on the East Cape pick you up from the airport. It means stopping everywhere imaginable between every little burb of every town to either see someone or pick something up. Hence what should and could have been a three hour drive ended up being a 7 hour drive!

Life in Te Kaha is much like life where I live in Southwest Montana. I think 60 miles round trip to the grocery store is a big deal...well, try living in Te Kaha. The closest town with a store is a good hour drive away and if you're anything like me, you save up all your errands for your trips to town. Well, I think Paul had been saving up since last January...needless to say, many stops were made along the way. But, it's all good...tomorrow the weather is to be stunning, sunny, warm, and calm seas. That means we're heading out on the Te Kaha Cat (catamaran) for some fishing, diving for crayfish (lobster) and Paua (abalone). We're set up to go catch some big kingfish (aka yellowtail)(50 pounders) on jigs and then some other species of food fish for dinner and of course the creme de la creme...crayfish and paua. I'm ready for a shellfish feast to beat all.

Let's see...the temperature is around 14 C which for those of us who are total ninny's when it comes to metric, = 56 degrees F. Why is it us Yankees refuse to learn metric? Of course it's now 11:10 PM here which is 3:06 am yesterday at home. HUH? Ok, I think it's time to take a soak in the hot tub and then head to bed. Tomorrow promises to be a grand day so more when I know what happened.

Ciao

Well I'm getting closer. The only screwup so far was forgetting my US cell phone at home on the charger! Not cool! At least I still have my NZ cell phone so I won't be completely lost. I do feel quite naked without it though.....

Everything else has gone pretty smoothly with the exception of a very complete pat down at the Los Angeles International Airport when my new titanium knee set off the alarm. The TSA ran their wand all over me and at least it buzzed at all the right places :-). I'm now a card carrying new owner of a new knee and even though it didn't go off at the airport in Butte, MT, it did in LA. I guess they have their machines set to a more sensitive setting. So now it's a waiting game until my flight to Auckland boards. I just love airports where a 12 oz beer costs you $6.50. I'll go broke fast at that rate.

OK, that's it for now. More once I actually get somewhere worth talking about.

Cheers